buddy, i new around here so maybe im not the best person to discuss about those things, but i got an Asus RT-N16 some days ago and im glad till now. it has Giga ports, the .11n (yes, it works on mixed G/N, but i doubt it will give you the same performance when you have G and N clients connected at the same time. Didnt test this one, but it's something hard to see on those appliances…), i cant talk about the durability since it has some days of life till now :P but the features the hardware gives u seems to be something really solid. About the range, using our great open firmwares around you should be ok! I really didn't see any problems with range and performance regarding wireless till now.
just for reference:http://www.cnet.com.au/asus-rt-n16-wireless-router-339298697.htm

Hope this could helps a bit… but lets wait for other ppl to give u more info! :)

I'll conditionally also recommend the RT-N16. I just replaced my main (gateway) router with an RT-N16, and both my upload and download rates have increased by 50%! With my (admittedly ~10 year old) Linksys WRT-54GS I was getting maxing out around 16M down and 2M up. I had ASSUMED that that was just the limit of my service (which made sense, since I have 8Mbps service with Comcast, and Speedboost is supposed to double that). But as soon as I replaced it with the RT-N16, I'm getting 25M down and 3M up. Furthermore, when I was downloading something big that maxed out my connection, I could not log into the Linksys. It was as if it was so bogged down handling that much traffic, it just couldn't respond (which was my fist clue that it may have been a bottleneck). I can max out my traffic now and the RT-n16 is still responsive, and has no problem updating bandwidth statistics at the same time.

Now the conditional part: since upgrading, I can no longer remotely log in to my home security camera DVR system. I can log in to my Windows Home Server, but not the DVR. Ports are forwarded, log in page comes up, but log in is unsuccessful. I've also found out my VoIP phone service no longer works! My VoIP gateway can no longer register with my service. So I'm having some issues (don't know if it's this particular release of Tomato USB, or what), but I'm really hoping to get them worked out, as I really like the improved speed!

Assuming you want to use the tomato firmware I'd go with ASUS rt-n16. I upgraded to this from the wrt54gl : )
Also the technicians at the asus support forum are open and welcome use of third party firmware.

In terms of range, how much better is it than the old standby, the WRT54G? I'd like to cut my home wireless down to 1 device — right now I'm running 2 WRTs as WDS using the original Tomato firmware. With a single router, it has to be able to get through 2 sets of hardwood floors. With just a single WRT, the signal on the 1st floor is unreliable.

I can confirm the Asus RT-N16 has a much greater range than a WRT54G, I have a v1.1 WRT (old school) and I thought it had good range until I got the Asus…the Asus accomplishes this task at only 17mw of transmit power. Whereas the WRT would need at least 80mw to reach out and touch my antenna from far away :)

My vote goes for the Netgear WNR3500L. I was able to pick it up for about $60 locally at Staples with one of those $25 off $75 coupons that are all over the web. Also, even though the RT-N16 has a little more horsepower under the hood, I was looking for a black router. I upgraded from a Linksys WRT54GL and the wireless range has been greater using less power. Plus with the added USB, FTP server and Media Server it's been a worthwhile upgrade.

@ytsejam1138
the "black router" thing is something to consider! lol
seriously!!! I had to change many things here because of a white router! lol my wife almost killed me cause of the "white thing" between tons of "black things"! lol
thats the kind of thing that i didnt think about, but women can see those things in a sec!